Help me buying a new computer!

[Kaak]

rasbelin, dell sells computers in europe!

[Pekka]

So does Afghan heroin, and still I won't buy it even if it someone recommended .

[Kaak]

touche

[Pekka]

Nothing against Dell, but I don't want it.. I don't want any other big brand either.. I just want to buy the parst and put it together myself .

[leftover_crack]

Asher is it difficult putting it together? Or is it pretty straightforward? (Connect Socket A to Socket B etc..)

I know how to get it to work once its all together using the root command prompt. But im totally in the dark about the physical stuff involved in assembling a CPU

[Pekka]

Besides, when I die and have to fill out the form at heavens gates:

1. Have you sinned? If so, do you regret it? (if last question is no, you can't get in).

2. Did you ever have a Dell computer? Did you ever regret it? (if last question is no, then you are too stupid to enter).



In other words buy Dell, go straight to hell.

[Asher]

Originally posted by leftover_crack
Asher is it difficult putting it together? Or is it pretty straightforward? (Connect Socket A to Socket B etc..)

I know how to get it to work once its all together using the root command prompt. But im totally in the dark about the physical stuff involved in assembling a CPU

It's very simple, but a lot can go wrong if you're not careful -- especially with AMD systems.

Good motherboards come with excellent documentation that help you set it up, but most of it is common sense. There's usually only one place for something to plug in anyway.

The most difficult part, especially with the AMD systems, is installing the heatsink + fan. One of the most common reasons for Athlon's demise is cracking the core when installing the HSF. You need to push pretty hard to get the thing on, but not too hard. You also have to make sure to get an Athlon motherboard with overheating protection. Incase your fan fails, or you didn't install the HSF right, you want the chip to shut off when it's about to overheat. Without this protection, the chip will just burn itself (and the motherboard) up pretty quickly on a bad installation.

With the Pentium 4 systems this isn't a concern. They've set up the CPU socket so it's pretty much impossible to crack the chip installing the HSF, and the P4 comes with that overheating protection built in to every chip anyway (and it's more advanced).

[Eroberer]

Just a little bit about the graphics cards. NVidia's 2D performance is not horrible, if it's less than ATi's or Matrox's at all. I have never heard any complaints about any cards 2D performance for a while.

The standards are good to know. DirectX 8.1 includes support for vertex shaders and pixel shaders, as well as all previous DirectX functions, meaning that any DX8.1 compliant card will be able to perform these functions on the card itself. DX8.1 compliant cards right now are the nVidia GeForce 4 cards (4600 Ti, 4200Ti, and several more), and ATi's Radeon 8000 cards (8500, 8000, I believe). DirectX 9, which is being released I think in January, includes many more really cool features, and like DX8, DX9 compliant cards will do these features on the card. The only DX9 compliant card right now is ATi's Radeon 9700, although Matrox's latest Parhelia chip is partly DX9 compliant. NVidia's coming offering (right now called NV30), will be DX9 compliant, and should be ungodly fast. So basically, you get prettier pictures with the higher DirectX versions. Asher said don't get any of the nVidia MX cards (e.g. GeForce 4 MX), because they're only DX7 compliant (I believe), and are also slow.

Speed is another thing. That is determined by how any pixel or texture (can't remember which) pipelines you have, the core MHz speed, the memory speed/bandwidth, and a couple other things I can't remember. But when looking at the benchmarks for cards, you'll see Mtexels/sec, triangles/second, and some other nifty numbers that are better when higher, and nVidia will probably have the highest.

Then there is the memory that is on the card. Since 3D cards handle so many textures and textured pixels, and whatnot, the more memory, the faster your frames will be at high detail.

Asher also mentioned vid card drivers, and all I know is that ATi went for a very long time without updating its drivers for some reason, and when they did update them, they were sluggish or buggy or something. I hear there latest offering is pretty good though. NVidia on the other hand, releases a steady stream of drivers, and even leaks some very fast drivers to the public that are like release candidates so to speak. Also, there is a fairly active driver hacking community around NVidia, which opens up hidden features of the drivers, such as easy overclocking of the GPU and memory, and controlling antialiasing and stuff. I use one somewhat old hacked driver that gets me 300 more 3D Marks compared to Dell's drivers without overclocking. =)


Anyway, I'm sorry I can't offer any links to better explanations, but I hope this gives you a basic understanding (hope it doesn't just confuse you more, actually). I suggest looking at Tom's Hardware, Asandtech (something), and other such hardware guru sites for more detailed info.

[Pekka]

Eroberer, thanks for your help. Don't worry, I understood perfectly your post and it was helpfull.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Asher
Recommending someone not get a DVD player on a new PC is possibly the stupidest thing you have ever said.

Perhaps you do realise that there is no one standard DVD recordable format right now? Since no known PC software has been released on DVD, what is the purpose other than watching porn?

Can't you just attempt to comprehend what others have said istead of jerking your knees?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Asher
The most difficult part, especially with the AMD systems, is installing the heatsink + fan. One of the most common reasons for Athlon's demise is cracking the core when installing the HSF.

[snipped]

With the Pentium 4 systems this isn't a concern. They've set up the CPU socket so it's pretty much impossible to crack the chip installing the HSF, and the P4 comes with that overheating protection built in to every chip anyway (and it's more advanced).

perpetuating a common myth again. Acutally, a few common myths.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Perhaps you do realise that there is no one standard DVD recordable format right now? Since no known PC software has been released on DVD, what is the purpose other than watching porn?

Can't you just attempt to comprehend what others have said istead of jerking your knees?

I think you're confusing DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, etc with a regular DVD-ROM...

You said don't get a DVD -- which implies DVD-ROM since that's very common and very cheap. I would agree with you not to buy a DVD burner, but that's not what you said.

And you simply don't know what you're talking about. DVD software has been available for years.
SuSE Linux on DVD's been out since 1999: http://www.suse.de/en/company/press/.../SuSE_DVD.html

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
perpetuating a common myth again. Acutally, a few common myths.

Feel free to tell me which one of those are myths, seeing as I built about two dozen high end Athlon systems this summer myself.

Core-cracking with Athlons is quite easy to do and is FAR more common than the Intel systems. Intel's socket design (and the heat spreader) do wonders.

As for overheating protection -- where's the myth? It's fact that the P4 has builtin thermal protection. All P4s have it. With the Athlons you gotta make sure the motherboard supports it.

There are no myths there, UR, and that much is obvious because you never bothered to elaborate. Just typical of you. The irony here is you made a knee-jerk comment to me a couple posts ago, when that's clearly not the case. It's the other way around.

[notyoueither]

The A team:

Motherboard. Asus P4S8X for Intel, A7V8X for AMD
both support 8x AGP. Both have optional Serial ATA (the drives aren't out yet though)
both have LAN and FireWire on board
the A7V8X will support DDR400
the P4S8X is in stores now, the A7V8X should arrive next week

Processor. P4 533FSB 2.266 or higher, Athlon XP (any)

RAM. DDR333, 512M
a bit high priced in NA right now, but creeping down

HardDrive, Western Digital 8M cache 80G or 120G
beware, the drive manufacturers are decreasing warrantees to 12 months as of Oct 1

Floppy. Nope. The P4S8X can't use one.

CD/Optical. LG or LiteOn Combo CDRW/DVD AND a 52x CD ROM
do you want to burn out your nice burner/porn machine playing games?

Sound. SB Audigy
get the bulk, OEM card if the MP3 software or some cheap games don't interest you
or try the 6 channel audio on board first to see if it suits you before you buy a card

Video. Radeon 9700Pro 128M
but the Ti4600's just dropped a bunch in price

The B team:

nah, the A team don't cost too much right now, and you said the good stuff

[Pekka]

notyoueither, funny, I was looking for those exactly same components just last night when I was trying to calculate the costs.. .

That Radeon 9700Pro 128M seems to be the card to get at the moment. I read some tests and they all said it was the best in all the areas tested. That's nice. It was a little expensive though.. about $500. 9000Pro would go for $150.. But there was obvious quality difference between the models.

Is it a good idea to get a Combo CDRW/DVD ? How long these last? 4 months? . I don't know, I haven't tried. Or maybe I should leave this old computer with me (since this is not worth anything at all), and I could keep this as a burner PC and such. I was thinking of setting up a small network, just for fun, I could maybe keep this as a storage too. We'll see.

It's also quite expensive to get 512M of those 333DDRs, but I'm willing to get enough memory. I've always bought too little memory.

I'm still not sure about what soundcard to get, and MB and CPU is still a bit grey area to me.

I'd like to get one of those cool modified cases, I want it to look original!